| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Child of Storm by H. Rider Haggard: Panda, "that it is hard to say which of them wrought this deed. It
would have been easier to tell you of greater matters. Yet I have taken
your fee, and I must earn it--I must earn it. Dust, you are dumb. Now,
my Idhlozi, my Spirit, do you speak?" and, holding his head sideways, he
turned his left ear up towards the sky, then said presently, in a
curious, matter-of-fact voice:
"Ah! I thank you, Spirit. Well, King, your grandchild was killed by the
House of Masapo, your enemy, chief of the Amasomi."
Now a roar of approbation went up from the audience, among whom Masapo's
guilt was a foregone conclusion.
When this had died down Panda spoke, saying:
Child of Storm |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from 1492 by Mary Johntson: our three men sent wide the ball. We looked for terror
always from the flame, the smoke and great noise, and so
there was terror here for a moment and a bearing back in
which Juan and Gonzalo got loose and made a little way up
path. But a barbarian was here who could not long be
terrified. Caonabo sent half his horde against Guarico, but
himself had come to La Navidad. That painted army rallied
and overtook the fleeing men.
Shouting, making his swung sword dazzle in light, Diego
de Arana raced down path, and Diego Minas and Beltran
the cook and Juan Lepe with him. Many a time since then,
|
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Tarzan of the Apes by Edgar Rice Burroughs: to the credit."
"To the already great burden of the obligations we owe you,
sir," said Professor Porter, with trembling voice, "is now
added this greatest of all services. You have given me the
means to save my honor."
Clayton, who had left the room a moment after Canler,
now returned.
"Pardon me," he said. "I think we had better try to reach
town before dark and take the first train out of this forest. A
native just rode by from the north, who reports that the fire
is moving slowly in this direction."
Tarzan of the Apes |
The fourth excerpt represents the element of Earth. It speaks of physical influences and the impact of the unseen on the visible world, and is drawn from To the Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf: before he had married, he thought, looking across the bay, as they
stood between the clumps of red-hot pokers, he had walked all day. He
had made a meal off bread and cheese in a public house. He had worked
ten hours at a stretch; an old woman just popped her head in now and
again and saw to the fire. That was the country he liked best, over
there; those sandhills dwindling away into darkness. One could walk
all day without meeting a soul. There was not a house scarcely, not a
single village for miles on end. One could worry things out alone.
There were little sandy beaches where no one had been since the
beginning of time. The seals sat up and looked at you. It sometimes
seemed to him that in a little house out there, alone--he broke off,
To the Lighthouse |
